A week ago Manchester City were undone by two ex-United players, but a lot has changed since then A week can be an awfully long time in football and it seems like a lifetime ago that Manchester City fans were having to endure the taunts of two United rejects. As Jose Mourinho looked to be steadying his ship with a comfortable Champions League victory away from home, Pep Guardiola was marching into the home dressing room at the Etihad to tell his players they had embarrassed him and Rafael and Memphis Depay were hamming up their part in enforcing City’s first defeat of the season.
Four games and seven days later, those taunts look largely irrelevant and so too increasingly the latest installment of Pep vs Jose. City’s handsome win over Cardiff moved them six points and 16 (sixteen!) goals better off than their neighbours after they were held by Wolves at Old Trafford. And things got even better on Tuesday night when Phil Jones missed a penalty to send the Reds crashing out of the league cup while Phil Foden was pulling the strings to send City through. It seemed odd beforehand that the Oxford tie had not been chosen for TV coverage given it resembled more of a classic cup tie, but oh boy did Sky get their money’s worth with United.
Lower league opposition trips to Old Trafford are clearly not the dull home-bankers they were in the Sir Alex Ferguson era and the developments of that game filtered through to the Kassam Stadium, where Guardiola left newspaper sub-editors sweating by not emerging for his post-match press conference until after the penalty shootout had been concluded. As United dominate the back pages day after day – never ignored, remember – City are quietly pulling further and further away to the point where the only way Depay can back up his claim that Manchester remains red is if he is talking about app ratings.
Six points in the league is not necessarily fatal, but given the gulf they have to make up from last season the meltdown between Mourinho and Paul Pogba over the last week has been so fast and alarming it has got City fans as worried as it has delighted in case drastic action is taken with a long part of the campaign to go. As issues abound at Carrington, the mood within the City Football Academy is a lot happier after the last seven days. A number of players have more minutes under their belt, Riyad Mahrez has three goals to his name, Foden has shown his potential and been backed by his manager to become a club legend, the Blues are well placed in the Premier League and through to the last-16 of a competition in which United and Chelsea or Liverpool are not. The Manchester clubs will always be rivals but it is looking less and less like they are in direct competition while Mourinho and Guardiola remain in charge.
